Good evening: Allow me to say that I find that Alan's questions, below, are quite pertinent to this discussion, and I trust that some of the Board members on the List may decide to respond in the light of their personal experiences. I would also raise a specific point regarding "CCWG proposal Section 7.3" about removing individual ICANN Board members: There, it is proposed that any Supporting Organisation or Advisory Committee (SO/AC) may initiate the process to remove an individual Director appointed by the Nominating Committee, That is not acceptable for the following reasons: 1. It is a fundamental objective of the internal governance of ICANN that there is a permanent and effective balance between the interests of the functional/operational communities and the public interest. This is most important in the light of ICANN's regulatory responsibilities respecting fair competition, users' interests and international and local law. Some of these responsibilities have significant financial and economic consequences. 2. When the Nominating Committee process was initially established in 2002, it was as a successor to, and a surrogate for, the election of ICANN Board members by Internet users. The NomCom process was accepted at the time by the ICANN Community as a feasible method of creating and re-enforcing the necessary balance in ICANN's internal governance. Thus, the idea that any particular Supporting Organisation may threaten to attack individual independent Board members - appointed by the NomCom - from which they happen to dissent, would seriously undermine the independence of NomCom appointed Directors as well as the intrinsic balance of powers and interests within the ICANN structure. 3. Since the Section 7.3 proposal, if implemented, would further compromise the balance between commercial interests and the public interest in ICANN, it would inevitably give rise to additional demands for enhanced governmental influence within ICANN through the GAC. I trust that CCWG and CWG shall reconsider their positions in this regard. Regards Christopher Wilkinson PS: For the attention of the Co-Chairs of CCWG and CWG: I did not see this clause before. I do not know where it came from or who drafted it. It was not discussed on the conference calls which I attended, although - as you know - I have not been able to attend all of them. On 01 Sep 2015, at 23:10, Alan Greenberg <alan.greenberg@mcgill.ca> wrote:
This is a personal message (not on behalf of the ALAC) and targeted at the voting directors on this list.
We have been told regularly that if the community has the power to remove individual directors, and particularly if those appointed by SO/ACs can be removed by sole action of the entity that appointed them, that this would impinge on the independence of directors and particularly, those directors threatened with the potential of removal would act differently, presumably to appease their communities or protect their right to remain an ICANN director.
If I counted correctly, there are eleven voting directors on this list, four appointed by AC/SOs and seven by the NomCom. I think I know most of you to some extent, and some I have worked closely with or observed for quite a number of years.
My own perspective is that if you were confronted with a situation where you had to pander to the community or do what you thought was right, it would be a moderately easy choice, and it would be to do what you thought was right. Would you consult and discuss? Certainly. Would you change your opinion in the face of a good argument, I hope so. But would you just give in to protect your position? For those of you that I know, not very likely, perhaps you would move in the opposite direction!
If my assessment is correct, then the question becomes do we believe that SO/ACs will deliberately appoint people who are malleable and will vote as their SO/AC desires instead of making decisions on behalf of ICANN as a whole. I would contend that there is nothing to prevent them doing so now. If there is strong evidence of a problem, then we should take action regardless of changes proposed. If not, then perhaps the problem is not as large as some presume.
Given all that, what am I misunderstanding and what is the problem with the power to remove directors, a power that I suspect will be used as often as the current board power to unilaterally remove directors and most liaisons without cause (https://www.icann.org/resources/pages/governance/bylaws-en/#VI-11).
Alan
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